The Viking's Chosen by Quinn Loftis (15)

Torben—my personal guardsman—who I now knew was so much more than that, was brushing my hair while I wore nothing but a sheet. It sounded terrible when I thought about it. And it would certainly look terrible to an outsider. But the gesture was completely innocent on both of our parts. Regardless, I would never be able to admit that it had happened to anyone. I was sure my mother would faint where she stood if she happened upon us, and my sister Dayna would start singing a halleluiah chorus.

I myself was about to curl up in a ball and purr like a well-loved kitten. After having had Cathal’s repugnant hands and mouth on me, Torben’s hands were like a cleansing rain, washing away the filth of the memories that were attempting to overwhelm me. I had been sinking into the pit of my mind, sure that nothing would ever be the same again. Then he had come. Torben had come and rescued me, pulling me from the mire of my thoughts.

“What are you thinking about?” Torben asked as he stood and retrieved the pitcher he’d left heating in the fires’ embers. He poured the steaming water into a small wash basin and picked up a hand towel that was resting on the table beside my bed.

“I am thinking about how my mother would wilt like a dying flower, and my youngest sister would be planning the arrival of our first child if either were to walk into my chambers and see us in such a state,” I admitted.

He paused after wringing the water from the towel. “Yes, I imagine this would look rather damning, considering that under that flimsy fabric, you are as naked as the day you were born.”

The left-over tears that had been in my eyes were completely dry now. All it took to stop my sobbing, apparently, was a handsome warrior pointing out how unclothed I was beneath a sheet.

Torben sat down in front of me this time and reached up with the warm cloth. He pressed it to my face, and my eyes closed of their own accord as he began to wipe away the evidence of my break from reality. His touch was surprisingly gentle for such a large man. His hands were probably more familiar with handling a sword than a woman’s skin. But his movements were slow and confident. His face held a level of concentration that I knew from experience was not needed to accomplish such a simple task as wiping a face clean. But Torben seemed determined to do a thorough and proper job. My lips turned up in a small smile at my thoughts.

“What?” he asked as he pulled back slightly to look down at me.

I shook my head as my smile grew wider. “I was just thinking about how hard you were concentrating on your task.”

He chuckled but didn’t look the least embarrassed. “I believe if you’re going to do something, no matter what it may be, then you should always do it to the best of your capability.”

“Even washing a face?”

His own lips tilted in a roguish smile. “Certainly when washing the face of such a beautiful female.”

My eyebrows rose. “Beautiful, huh? And what if she’s not beautiful?”

He frowned. “Now why would I be cleaning the face of an ugly female?”

I couldn’t help myself. I laughed at the seriousness in his voice and the utter dismay in his eyes. Though I could tell he was teasing, he seemed so appalled at the notion that it was comical.

“Forgive me, my lord, for assuming you would lower yourself to such a task,” I said in my best aghast voice.

“Well, Princess, see to it that you do not assume such ridiculous notions again.” He paused with a stern look, but then his eyes softened, and his mouth returned to its flirty grin. Torben tapped me on the end of the nose playfully. “He has no bloody clue how lucky he is,” he murmured.

My breath caught as I watched the playfulness fade from his eyes only to be replaced by something else, something much more consuming. He set the towel down and shifted closer to me. My mind was screaming at me to back away. This wasn’t my betrothed, this was not even a man I would be allowed to marry. He was a guard in my father’s royal army. His station was below mine and yet he was one of the most honorable men I’d ever met.

As his face moved closer to mine, one of his large hands reached up and cupped my cheek. I had to force myself to breathe so I didn’t pass out. I didn’t want to move. I didn’t even want to blink for fear I would miss something, or that he would suddenly disappear and I would come to realize this whole thing had been a dream. His lips were mere inches from my own when he spoke again.

“Princess, I’m going to need you to tell me to back off.” His voice was deep and rough.

My blood felt as though it were heating in my veins, and my heart felt as though it was going to beat up out of my throat. I swallowed and licked my dry lips, not missing the way his eyes followed the movement.

“And if I do not want to tell you to back off?” I asked, knowing I was playing with fire. Apparently, I liked the idea of being burned, because I was not about to push him away.

“Then we are both in trouble.”

“Why is that?” My voice sounded breathless, and I thought maybe I should be embarrassed over the sound, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. All I could see were those intense eyes and full lips. All I could think about was how badly I wanted those lips on mine. I wanted them to replace the memory of Cathal and give me the chance to have a man kiss me with passion—real, raw passion.

“Because I’m planning on kissing you. I have no willpower to stop, nor do I have the desire to stop. So, unless you tell me right now that you don’t want this, I am going to kiss you.”

I simply stared back at him, waiting, practically daring him to do what he was threatening. Good thing the man didn’t back down from a challenge, because I might have taken the choice from him if he hadn’t acted when he did.

“So be it,” he whispered before slipping his hand around to the nape of my neck and pulling me toward him.

My eyes closed, and the breath rushed out of me as his warm lips pressed to my own. It wasn’t a gentle kiss. It was a kiss that spoke of possession and want, desire and need. It was a kiss that would ruin a woman for any other man after him. It was the type of kiss that every woman should have as her first.

I felt his mouth part, and his tongue press against my lips, demanding entrance. I’d never willingly kissed a man in such a way, and, had it been anyone else, I think I might have hesitated. I didn’t hesitate with Torben. This man, who had shown up at my chamber doors half a month ago and declared himself my new guard, had captured my attention from the first look. He’d driven me crazy, made me furious and needy in the same breath, and protected me without worry for his own safety. I opened my mouth and moaned when I felt the heat of his tongue touch my own.

Why on earth weren’t people kissing all the time? That’s what kept running through my head. If this was what it felt like to really be kissed by someone who you desired and who desired you, then why were people doing anything else besides kissing? Silly and childish thought? Probably, but then you aren’t the one sitting on my bed having your mouth ravished by a handsome rogue. When that happens to you, then you can judge me on my thoughts about simply kissing every minute of every day for the rest of all time.

His hand tightened on my neck, and his other hand landed on my waist and pulled me closer. I had to remind myself that there was nothing under the sheet, because I desperately wanted to wrap my arms around him, but that would have left me a little more exposed than I was ready to be.

Torben’s deep rumble only caused me to open my mouth wider and push closer to him, as though I could simply crawl right inside of him to be as close as possible. I craved his heat. I needed his touch and at any moment, I was truly afraid I was going to start rubbing up against him the way Thomas’s cat, Sir Rufus, rubbed against anything that got close to him.

I ran my tongue across the roof of his mouth and was rewarded with a deep chuckle. I did it again in hopes that he would chuckle one more time. He did. I had no idea how much time had passed when he finally pulled back. My lips were slick and swollen, and my breathing sounded as though I’d run from the stables to the kitchen and back again.

Torben looked down into my eyes, and I was afraid to put words to the emotions I saw there. I felt them, too, but it was much too soon—not to mention a tad forbidden. I could not fall for him. I couldn’t… and yet I was pretty sure I already had.

“Thank you,” he said softly as the back of his hand caressed my warm cheeks.

“For what?”

His eyes crinkled at the sides as he smiled. “For allowing me the honor of tasting you.”

I knew my flushed skin only got darker, because his words sounded so much more provocative than he probably meant them to be.

He winked at me.

Well, maybe he had meant them just as provocatively as they’d sounded. The scoundrel.

“Would I be completely unladylike if I said it was my pleasure?” I asked him.

He chuckled. “I would consider it the highest compliment.”

We stared at one another in what I could only describe as awed silence. Our eyes ran over each other’s faces, and his hands continued to pet me—my face, my back, and my sides. He was stirring up desire in me like a man stoking a fire. I should have told him to stop, seven hells, we needed to stop, and yet I could not get my lips to cooperate with my brain. How was I going to go back to treating him like just a random castle guard? How could I ever return to the way things had been?

“Allete.” My name rolled off his tongue so smoothly, and I found that I loved the sound of it. “I need you to know, I did not come in here with the intentions of seducing you.”

Torben sounded truly worried that I would think such a thing about him.

“I know that,” I assured him. “I would have never thought that.”

“I was worried about you,” he confessed. “After what that horse’s arse had done, I needed to see for myself that you were okay.”

“Only I wasn’t,” I said pathetically. I gritted my teeth as I thought back to how I’d crumbled under the weight of what had happened and what was to come.

“No, love, you weren’t.” He leaned forward and pressed his lips to my forehead and, for the first time in my life, I felt cherished. “But that’s why I’m here. To make sure that you will be okay.”

My brow drew together as I looked up at him. “What do you mean? You speak as though you knew me before we met.”

He shook his head. “I didn’t know you, but I knew of you and knew that you would be important to me.”

I was not sure how to interpret his words. I felt as though there was some hidden meaning behind them. There was something he wasn’t telling me.

“I’m not going to be okay if I have to marry that man,” I said, trying not to think too hard about the meaning of his words. “I thought I could do it. I thought I could just grit my teeth and do what I needed to do for my kingdom.” I looked down at my hands that were now clenching the sheet. The tears that had fled were threatening to once again flood my face. “But I can’t. Torben, I can’t be with Cathal. He’ll kill me, or I’ll kill me.”

A deep growl rushed from Torben as he grabbed my shoulders. “Never say such things,” he bit out. “You will never take your own life, and I will do everything I can to ensure that you do not marry him.”

“How?” The word was out before I had time to think. I knew I shouldn’t dare hope, but I couldn’t help myself. Could Torben really keep me from having to marry Cathal? It wasn’t possible. But the steel in his eyes said otherwise. How could he do such a thing? He was a guard in my father’s castle. How on earth could he prevent my marriage to a foreign king?

“I am still working out the details,” he said as he stood and backed away from the bed. I felt cold at his sudden retreat and fought my urge to reach out and snatch him back to my side.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m looking for your sleep garments,” he said as he glanced around the room.

I motioned toward the wardrobe directly behind him. “There should be a gown in there.”

He smiled at me. “As much as I love the idea of you naked, I fear it could be damning to your reputation if someone were to come in.”

I chuckled. “Yes, it would be quite damning.”

Torben searched through the wardrobe until he found a gown and then walked over to hand it to me. He turned and kept his back to me as I dropped the sheet and slipped the gown over my head. I tugged it down my body until it fell to the floor, and then I resumed my seat on my bed.

“All right, I’m decent.”

He turned and looked at me, his eyes starting at the top of my head and traveling down until he reached my bare feet. “No, love, I’m afraid you are far too tempting to qualify as decent.”

I smiled at him. He was so handsome. And so not mine. Why was life so unfair? I would renounce my right as a princess in a heartbeat if it meant I could be with Torben and didn’t have to marry Cathal. I would give up all the luxury just to have my happiness and safety and the possibility of real actual love.

“Thank you, Torben, for caring for me,” I said after several heartbeats of silence.

“It is not a hardship, Allete.” His eyes burned with an intensity that held me in place. I didn’t want to move for fear that he would look away. For some reason, that was the last thing I wanted him to do.

“Actually, caring for another person is always a hardship. It is in our nature to care for ourselves first,” I told him.

“Sometimes, yes. But then, sometimes, we come across a person who means more to us than ourselves. Sometimes we do anything for that person. Then there is no hardship.”

I watched as Allete’s eyes flickered with surprise at my words. I knew she did not intend to be insulting, but it made me want to laugh that she assumed I would not be capable of any sort of deep thought. As a lowly guard, in comparison to her station, it would make sense for me to be uneducated and simple. But she didn’t know that I wasn’t just a guard. Nor was I just a warrior of my clan. I was the son of an Oracle, and my mother had no intention of allowing me to remain ignorant.

“How do you know when you have found such a person?” she asked.

My lips turned up in a small smile. I retook my seat next to her on the bed and brushed some errant hair away from her face. “You know because they are all you can think about. Even when you know they should not be on your mind, they are still there. You know because everything becomes second to their wellbeing, safety, and happiness.”

“What if they cannot be yours? What if it’s just not possible?” Her eyes were swirling with questions as she stared up at me. Her shoulders were tense, and I could tell that she wanted me to simply walk away. Allete wanted me to make this easy on her. I wished I could do that, but even if she wasn’t the woman in the prophecy, I would not be able to walk away from her. At some point, between the moment I first laid eyes on her and the moment we now shared, the moment where she sat staring at me with such need, I had realized that my life would never be complete without her.

“Who are we to decide what is possible and what is not? I responded. “We should leave the prospect of possibilities to the gods, and we should simply be the ones trying.”

She shook her head at me and huffed. “That isn’t the way of it, Torben. At least not for me. I don’t know where you truly come from, but here, you don’t just walk about trying new things. There are responsibilities, duties, and expectations. I can’t just flit about like a whimsical girl with romantic notions.” Her hands fidgeted in her lap, and she ducked her head, no longer looking at me.

I pressed a finger under her chin and lifted it until her eyes met mine once again. My beautiful Allete. She was smart, beautiful, and brave, and she didn’t even realize just how much control she had over her own future. Would it come without pain or sacrifice? No, it would not. In fact, it would probably be more painful that she wanted to truly know. But that did not mean it was impossible. I had to somehow make her see that I was the man for her. I needed to make her realize this, not only for the hope of my clan, but for her own people as well. For both of our peoples, she would have to leave her kingdom and become part of mine.

“I will do whatever it takes to prove to you that your destiny is just that—yours. You are the master of your own life. There will be bumps and detours along the way, but at every turn, there will be a choice. Do not let yourself become a victim of your circumstances. You are too special for that fate.”

How was I supposed to respond to Torben’s statement? How could Torben possibly understand that, in my world, there was no choice, only duty? I was sure he couldn’t possibly understand that. I wanted to scream at him to stop giving me false hope.

“I wish that I could make your words my own, but we come from very different situations,” I tried to explain. I didn’t know how to verbalize what I needed him to know. I was frustrated and hurt.

“What do you want, Princess?” he asked. The look in his eyes said he was daring me to be honest with him.

“I want a life that is my own,” I finally admitted.

“Then it is your goal in life to make that desire a reality, not just a dream.” He stood and backed away toward the door. “You need your rest, and I need to think about how to keep Cathal from repeating today’s events.”

I winced as I saw his entire body tense as he said these words. “I appreciate your help, Torben, and your willingness to protect me. But…” I paused and took a deep breath to steady myself for what I knew I had to say. “This can’t happen again. We can’t be.”

I expected anger or hurt, but what I got instead was an amused smirk.

“I may be a guard, but sometimes I find that I have trouble following orders. Princess, this is happening, and it will continue to happen until you are mine.” He turned without another word and walked out of the door, closing it quietly behind him.

“Ugh!” I growled. “Infuriating, bull-headed, ridiculous male,” I snapped to the empty room. Frustration and helplessness threatened to overwhelm me. Why must I fall for him, the one I could not have? Why did he have to be so certain that we would be together and that I had some sort of choice in the matter? It was like talking to a cat. He stared at you while you spoke, and you might even believe for a second that he understood what you were saying, but then he just up and walked away with a confidence that made it clear he was going to do what he damn well pleased.

I stood, unable to sit still any longer, and began to pace the room. The warmth of the fire had chased away the chill on the outside, but it did nothing to warm the cold I felt enveloping my heart. To survive, I was going to have to harden myself. If I wanted to keep my sanity while being married to Cathal, then I would have to come to terms with the fact that my life would simply be about surviving. I couldn’t afford to hope for anything else. There would be no celebrations, no joy, or happiness. I would know only sorrow and pain. I would constantly be surrounded by the anger and evil of a man who cared for no one or nothing but himself.

I would have to learn that genuine smiles were a thing of the past. Laughter would be foreign to me, and joy would no longer be a part of my vocabulary. Instead of light, I would be surrounded by darkness, and I was going to have to learn how to survive. I wouldn’t thrive; how could I in such darkness?

By my twentieth turn across my chambers, I was ready to scream. Torben had been able to calm me down. He’d been able to drag me back from the despair into which I had been sinking. Who would drag me back from the pain of knowing I could never be with him? Who would help me heal over the loss of a chance at happiness?

“Why did you let him kiss you?” I seethed at myself. It would have been so much easier if I had never known how his lips felt or how his mouth tasted. “Easier?” I snorted. “I think not, Allete.” I couldn’t fool myself; kissing or not, it would be painful.

After fighting the frustration and hurt for over half an hour, I finally gave in. I let the sorrow fill me. I felt a single tear slide down my face and knew it would be the first of many. My heart was breaking for a love I would never know. Before the second tear fell, I found myself with my back pressed against the door, sliding down until I was sitting on the cold floor. It was the same position I’d found myself in once before, only then I’d been listening to Torben’s steady voice as I’d sat there, breaking down. This time there were no words of encouragement, just me with my tears and sorrow. I pulled my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around my legs. My head fell forward until my forehead pressed against them.

My shoulders shook as I bit my lip to keep the sobs from filling the room. I felt weak. My heart was broken in more ways than one, and my soul felt empty. I needed to be strong for my father, my sisters, and my kingdom, but I didn’t know how to be that person. I wanted to crawl away into a hole and curl up while the world moved on without me. It would be easier to be stuck than to move forward with the future that life had for me.

“Why?” I whispered to myself. “Why does it have to be like this?” Some part of me longed for someone to answer. I wanted to have some sort of reason that might make it easier to accept, but there was no mystical voice or sudden revelation. There was only me, a cold floor and tears that could not wash away the pain that would burn inside of me until the day I died.

I closed my eyes as the tears continued to fall. Wrapped in my grief, I didn’t even realize when sleep surrounded me and pulled me down. I didn’t hear the voice on the other side of the door whispering words of love to me. I didn’t hear the promise of protection and happiness.